The FBI on Radio
The early twentieth century was a time when America needed a new kind of agency to protect and defend against rampant crime, and thus, the Federal Bureau of Investigation was formed.
After President McKinley was assassinated, Vice President Teddy Roosevelt, took the Oval Office. He had no tolerance for corruption, and was a believer in the law and in the enforcement of that law. It was under his reform-driven leadership that the FBI would get its start.
After the Great War, America found that a whole new war was just beginning - on the streets! On one side was the rising tide of professional criminals, and on the other side was law enforcement, who were literally outgunned and ill-prepared to take on the surging national crime wave.
A good shake-up was needed for the Bureau of Investigation, and this came in the form of young lawyer, J Edgar Hoover. He was determined to reform the Bureau, quickly and thoroughly, and it very soon transformed to become the organized, professional, and effective force that he had envisioned.
During this period, several old time radio series were created which promoted the FBI. Some of these were supported by the Bureau - others were not. First came the G-Men episodes in 1935, which were written, produced and directed by Phillips H Lord, in association with the FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover, and these featured only closed FBI cases.
In 1944 came The FBI in Peace and War, a radio crime drama inspired by Frederick Lewis Collins' book of the same name. The series was long running, and Time Magazine noted it as the eighth most popular radio series in 1955. The series starred crime-fighter Martin Blaine as field agent Sheppard, and was told from the perspective of the bad guy, with the focus on how the FBI had hunted him down.
Then in April 1945 came This Is Your FBI, a fictitious crime drama which told stories based on true cases from the closed files of the FBI, but with names and places changed. During the war these sensational stories were about war criminals, Nazi agents and escaped prisoners, people that were a threat to our security, which of course was of paramount importance to our FBI.
In 1952 came I Was A Communist For The FBI. It’s hard to believe that these stories were not fiction but fact, which tell the true story of Matt Cvetic, a man who put his love for his country above everything else. The stories in the series were based on the actual records and authentic experiences of Matt Cvetic (portrayed by Dana Andrews) who infiltrated the top levels of the Communist Party for the Federal Bureau of Investigation from 1941 until 1950.
It has been around fifteen years since I first added The FBI in Peace and War to RUSC, and I recently discovered lots more episodes in the RUSC archives - you probably noticed I have been adding these this week. There are many more to come, so I hope that you'll enjoy listening to them as much as I have been doing!
If there are any other series we have on RUSC where you believe we may have some shows missing, let me know. In the meantime, I will continue searching the RUSC archives to see what other treasures I can find!
Happy listening my friends,
